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Technocracy Inc.: 1939

August 1939. Josephine County, Oregon. "New sign, erected seven years after Howard Scott talked of a survey of North America and formation of 'energy units,' which had widespread vogue in the early years of Depression." Another of Dorothea Lange's quirky-sign photos. View full size.

This movement arose during the Great Depression. Technocrats proposed replacing politicians and business people with scientists and engineers who had the technical expertise to manage the economy. A man named Howard Scott is considered the founder of the movement, which began right after the end of World War 1. The writings of Edward Bellamy some of the later works of Thorstein Veblen were influential in the movement's rise into the 1930s. Members came from all across the United States and Canada. Their "calling card" was owning and driving gray vehicles. Apparently they are still around:

Shorpy.com | History in HD is a vintage photo archive featuring thousands of high-definition images from the 1850s to 1960s. (Available as fine-art prints from the Shorpy Archive.) The site is named after Shorpy Higginbotham, a teenage coal miner who lived 100 years ago.